Pizza in Naples 'cooked with wood from coffins'

Italian prosecutors believe pizza in the southern city of Naples may be baked in ovens lit with wood from coffins dug up in the local cemetery, according to Italian daily Il Giornale.

Naples' graveyard has long been hunting ground for thievesPhoto: ANDREW TWORT

7:00AM BST 18 May 2010

"Pizza, one of the few symbols of Naples that endures... is hit by the concrete suspicion that it could be baked with wood from coffins," Il Giornale said.

Investigators in Naples are setting their sights on the thousands of small, lower-end pizza shops and bakeries that dot the city on suspicion that the owners may "use wood from caskets to keep ovens burning."

Naples' graveyard has long been hunting ground for thieves: last year, 5,000 flower pots were stolen from the cemetery.

"A gang might have set up a market for coffins sold to hard-hearted owners of bakeries and pizzerias looking to save money on wood," Il Giornale said.

According to tradition, Neapolitan pizza should be cooked in a stone oven with an oak-wood fire.